Movie Reviews

Laughology is a great study of laughter and if it doesn't ma

Haunted Flower | Indianapolis | 09/07/2010

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Laughology1 Disc Widescreen edition, released September 7, 2010

"Laughology" is the first ever feature documentary about the subject of laughing, written and directed by Albert Nerenberg. One man's loss of laughter after a string of bad events motivated his journey to find out more about laughter, why we laugh, what it does for us, how contagious it is, and hopefully how to get his own laugh back.

Laughing is a human action that occurs without learning. Babies do it without example, even deaf and blind babies can do it. We inherently have the need to laugh within us.

"The man with the most contagious laugh in the world" is a real hoot! Doug Collins has a silly, distinctive laugh that is so ridiculous, it once kept an audience in stitches for twenty minutes straight. His youtube video of laughter has been replayed over and over again by countless listeners on youtube who are in need of cheering up.

Norman Cousins engaged in laughing to save his life. He was painfully ill and found that ten minutes of good belly-aching laughter could result in half an hour of pain-free sleep. He watched tons of old episodes of Candid Camera to generate his laughter and much later found himself cured much to the surprise of all.

Laughter clubs have broken out everywhere including laughing yoga for exercise. There was a laughing disease epidemic in Tanzania in 1962 where thousands of people laughed for eighteen months, tested came back with nothing abnormal detected. Africa isn't the only place with laughter epidemics. A South African minister has brought holy laughter to Massachusetts resulting in falling down, rolling laughter.

The conclusion being reached was that just faking laughter can result in true laughter! This is a funny and interesting documentary and I challenge you not to laugh along with it! It's only 66 minutes long and pretty funny.

Special Features:

Over 40 minutes of extras that are even funnier than the documentary starting with the laughing yogi's routine which is utterly ridiculous and uproariously funny and includes an interview with him explaining what he does and why. Other extras include the origins and science of Dr. Kataria, the laughologist, longer interview segments with Sophie Scott and Doug Collins, and an interview with Robert Provine on understanding laughter."